I work in publishing and I like to read things. Herewith: free association on books, nice things I ate, publishing, editing, and other nice things I ate.

Wednesday, March 24, 2010

I was extremely efficient today and answered several questions.

The rules for this section: if you comment, you must answer each of the following three questions, just like I have. Thank you.

Claire Dawn asks, If you could visit anywhere in the world, where would you go and why?

Well, in no particular order except how they occur to me:

Turkey--because I've been their once and it totally brainwashed me. Wildly beautiful and convolutedly historical all at once. Slurp.

Syria--because I'd love to visit all the ancient cities there. I want to see Israel for the same reason, but I hear you can only go to either Syria or Israel on one American passport. Is that a rumor? But hey, as long as this is hypothetical and not necessarily routed in realistic ability, I might as well throw in Baghdad. So many historical places I'll probably never see :(

China--because I've never been. Chinese history has been perhaps my major reading topic since I was about 8 years old, and yet somehow it's never happened.

Japan--because I haven't been in eight years. On the other hand, getting over my Japan addiction, I suffered many symptoms of withdrawal I have heard associated with kicking a heroin addiction. So maybe I should leave that one alone.

As you may have gathered, and country full of Olde Things would do just mightily.

Ulysses asks, What's up with groundhog day? I mean, if a groundhog sees his shadow, we know there's going to be 6 more weeks of winter? Why don't we just look up at the sky? If it's cloudy, we won't see any shadows either. There's no need to go rousting a rodent out of bed just for a weather report. I know that if Puxatawney Phil were like my dad, waking him up from a nap would be something we'd only ever have the courage to do once... and only if his den were on fire. So here's my question: Which is better -- spaghetti with meat balls or spaghettini with pesto?

Ulysses, a valid question, I allow, but in my family we shun both of those pasta options in favor of cavatelli (little fat gnocchi-like cocoons with fresh ricotta kneaded into the pasta dough). Being total heathen gentiles, we usually eat this in a pork-based home-stewed tomato sauce.

Jjdebenedictis asks, Given a choice between deep-fried, crispy saltiness or creamy, decadent sweetness, which would you eat?

SALTY FRIED! If you had asked me as recently as two years ago, I would have emphatically chosen the other. But I guess now in my old age I just crave salt more. (Either that, or my body has cleverly noticed the trend of 100% of my family members to develop pre-diabetes and is trying to save me from myself. Either way, pass the fish & chips!)

Ok, now your turn.

1) Where would you visit and why?2) How do you take your pasta?3) Sweet or salty?

1) Where would you visit and why?This is really annoying my SO, but I just want to go to Paris all the time. (We were just there last year.) He wants to go to new places or something, but I just want to keep going to Paris. I'm so lame.

2) How do you take your pasta?In soup. Right now I'm obsessed with pho. Can't get enough noodles in broth. Mmmmm.

3) Sweet or salty?A few years ago, I would have said salty, but now I'm on the sweets train. Apparently, I'm trying to catch that pre-diabetes that Moonrat is so desperate to escape.

I spent a few days in China when I was a teenager and was in Hong Kong a year to the day after the Tiennaman Square massacre. Thousands and thousands of people marched in silent protest. Posters of those killed lined the subway stations. It was incredibly moving to be a part of something so big pushing against injustice.

Lunch break fun...1) Where? India, Egypt, Madagascar, SA, Australia. Also back to pretty much everywhere I have been and loved - so, back to Thassos, back to Athens, back to Nafplio. Back to Istanbul. Back to Granada. Back to Verona, Venice, and the Napoli area. Back to Brussels. Back to Paris. Back to Cornwall. Back to Cuba. And why? - because I want to, duh!2) Pasta q -either with pesto (& extra pine nuts and cheese on top) or else a big juicy tomato sauce with lots of herbs.3) Sweet or salt? Both! That's not a choice I'd like to have to make - it's like being asked "Mozart or Janacek?"! "Tolstoy or Dickens?", "Ashton or Petipa?", "Cake or pie?"!!

1) I have no answer to this question because I want to go everywhere. EVERYWHERE!!! Seriously, when it comes to the next holiday I'm happy flipping coins or spinning a wheel of fortune to decide amongst a long list of destinations.

1) Where would you visit and why?Argentina. In fact hubby and I want to try to live there for a while with the kids.

Note on Syria: I visited Jordan with friends in 2000. One of my friends was from Jordan and did not want to take us to Syria. It's a bummer, but they didn't want to risk being associated with Americans. I do believe that Israel will not accept you into their country if you have been to Syria, or vise versa -- that does sound familiar. You'd have to get a new passport.

Was about to go to sleep when I saw this, now I have to answer. Love it!

1. Ireland. Why? It's the land of my roots. I always wanted to reconnect with a past only my grandparents knew about. Plus, they say there is an Irish pub inside that country with smoking hot guys. Yes, from a deep reason to a shallow one.

2. I'm a white sauce kind of girl, so a really good Carbonara is for me. Goes right to the hips. Dang it!

3. Sweet. I have sugar for blood. It runs in the family. My father is turning 81 and yet he can eat anything sweet without blinking. I can only pray to be that way when I'm 81.

1) Where would you visit and why?China. Always wanted to see the giant buddhas in the mountains. Beautiful country. Plus one of my best friends who is Chinese-American and never been would come too.2) How do you take your pasta? A home-made sauce with a little salsa, fresh basil thrown in. Adding brown sugar and a splash of balsamico makes all the difference. And I like orechiette (little ears) or gemelli (little twists).3) Sweet or salty? Like you I would have said sweet a couple of years ago, but now I'd say salty. Not often though.

Okay, so...I'm like this nerdy theatre kid who's lived and breathed theatre from the age of 11 (we wont speak of how old I am now or how many years that's been so just know it's been awhile) so I've wanted to see Greece forever. The Greek Isles...Venice...ah, fuck it...Italy in general.

The more realistic choice is England (no, I don't mean London...I mean to explore ALL of bloody England!:) and Ireland and Scotland. THOSE I will get to and soon...I promise. Why? Part of me wants to say because of the beautiful countryside and the culture and history...hell, Shakespeare! But the other half of me says...cause there are tons of hot men with great accents there! (I now ask the culture loving side of me to forgive myself).

2. How do I like my pasta????

Hmmm...the fat side of me says w/light meat free red sauce but let's not lie people...we like our pasta in an amazing bechemel (sp?) or alfredo sauce...add some mushrooms and bacon...ahhhh, a future heart attack...but it was tasty! ;) But seriously...any type of butter or cream sauce on any type of pasta. I'm easy to please.

3. Sweet or Salty?

We have to pick just one? :( We can't create an option that includes both? :)

Okay okay, I'll pick. Usually it depends on my mood. I suppose I'll go with sweet though. I love my salty stuff...but as I think about it...and look in my pantry at my options of snacks...there are more sweet options (though low fat and tasty) than there are salty. Which is so strange cause if I can't put salt on my food I'm not a happy camper. Go figure. =P

The first place is Sambuca, Sicily - all of Sicily, really, but that's the town my father was born in, and there are still relatives there I've never met. In fact, someone found me on facebook and it turns out his grandfather was my grandmother's brother... his family all still lives in that same small town. Kind of fun talking to him, too, his English is limited and my Italian is terrible, and my English to Italian dictionary is getting quite the work out.

I'd love to see all of Italy, and the Vatican because, well, God, just to soak it in...

I'd also love to see Greece, it looks so beautiful, and again, history, ruins, what fun!! England, Scotland (which I hear is the most beautiful place on earth), and Ireland... France I'd like to see, too.

Ah, being independently wealthy would be nice, wouldn't it?

2. Favorite pasta.

I have many favorites. The family gravy is also pork based tomato sauce. I do make meatballs, but they're a mixture of beef and pork and the meat is totally cooked in the sauce, I also cook sausage in there and sometimes neckbones... or you could substitute pigs feet. I usually serve it over mostaccoli with the lines... I think it's actually called penne rigate. But I like it over springs or radiatores too.

I don't like pesto sauce, but I do like Fetuccini Alfredo as a side dish (I substitute that for the potato dish if I make steak or fried meatballs, because I'm obviously so health conscious)

Yeah, I think pesto's the only one I don't like :-) Oh, wait, meat sauce. I have friends who make meat sauce and they love it... I'm not crazy about it... probably because I grew up with a sauce you have to cook a lot longer and has less acid.

Can I have your recipe for "cavatelli (little fat gnocchi-like cocoons with fresh ricotta kneaded into the pasta dough)?"

1. Where would I visit and why:Italy. I have an Italy fixation and I even speak a little from three years of it in high school. Second choice: Eastern Europe, in general the Carpathians, Roumania and the surrounding countries.

2. How do you take your pasta:I like elbow macaroni or small shells, as they both hold the sauce. But my abso fav for pasta is garlicky home made mac and cheese, using so much cheese you get stretchy strings every time you dig a bite from the bowl.

3. Sweet or salty?That's wholly mood dependent, because I adore both. And since I read your answer I am absolutely dying to get ahold of proper fish and chips with that wonderful malted vinegar...with cheesecake to wash it down.

1. I would LOVE to go to Israel some day. There's nothing better than immersing yourself in ancient cultures.

I've been to Baghdad. It's absolutely amazing. There are ancient monuments scattered all around the countryside. Plus, all the palaces Saddam built are rather beautiful too. Not to mention the date trees along the rives. Gorgeous.

2. I like to eat penne with homemade alfredo sauce, topped with grilled chicken. Mmmm...

3. Salty *smacks lips*, but I also love sweet AND salty--like chocolate covered pretzels. Who says you have to choose?

1. Wales. Land of the past life which I'm not sure I had, but sorta kinda think I did.

(Next year will be the 20th anniversary of my relationship with The Missus. Since it began, in part, with a little back-and-forth email exchange/progressive story about a visit to Wales, she now tells me that we must visit there in 2011.)

2. NOT PESTO. Meatballs an excellent choice as long as they're not the bouncy sort, but the same thing could be said for, oh, tortellini. (Or ravioli, for that matter.) And oh my, yes, pork is somehow involved.

By a happy coincidence, this will be our dinner menu tonight.

3. Salty. My sweet tooth is definitely more pronounced than The Missus's, especially for breakfast (bring on the cinnamon buns! also the Danish! and the doughnuts! and the coffee cake! and the pancakes and waffles and French toast with syrup!). But when it comes to snacks, it's all about good old sodium chloride.

1) Where would you visit and why?Right now I'm craving Northern Ireland. (I bet you can guess why.) And I really want to go to Washington DC. I could use a dose of nationalism.2) How do you take your pasta?With lots of basil and any kind of sauce.3) Sweet or salty?Salty. I'm shunning it at the moment.

1) I'd love to visit pretty much everywhere on Earth, but my top (current) picks are Italy (I've never been!), Taiwan (the mountains are insanely beautiful), New Zealand (I went once, and need to go back with my husband.)

2) I'm with the people who love a good cream sauce, but my favorite? Brown butter and mizithra cheese!

3) SALTY!!! Seriously, I could probably eat a hot dog covered in onion rings and cheetos and be perfectly happy. I shouldn't do that, though. It would probably kill me.

I would visit the caves in France which house the earliest primal paintings of horse and wild animals and I would try somehow to imagine myself as those primitive people must have felt, depicting the world and its creatures for perhaps the very first time.

My pasta, I take it as it comes. One strand at a time, with or without sauce, slurping it through my lips in the loud way in which my mother said was rude.

(1) Santorini and Prague. Because five years ago, I had my tickets and then found out I was pregnant. (Although since then I've lived in the UK and now Montreal so I guess since I haven't made it to those places I can't keep acting indignant toward my son.)

(2) Spaghetti bolognese or with italian sausage diced in the sauce (both heavy on the garlic, please). With diced peppers, please.

(3) Savory. Then salty. Then sweet. So gimme beef jerky and then some chocolate.

1) Where would you visit and why?Greece. Not necessarily Ithaca, but definitely Athens and a few of the islands.

2) How do you take your pasta?A little restaurant here used to make tortellini alla penna, and my wife and I would go there specifically to consume it. Unfortunately, they're closed now and my own efforts have yet to live up to the legendary creamy/garlic/parmesan experience they provided.

1) Where would you visit and why?It is so hard to pick just one place, but if I can only go to one, it would be Tahiti. I've seen so many pictures of the bungalows over the water that I would love to go experience that. Heck I would love to go and write a book there. The waves crashing and the fish darting back and forth under my feet would be so soothing. I can already feel another novel coming on just thinking about it.

3) Sweet or salty?Both. I'm a sweet and salty type of girl. Those chex mixes with the pretzels and chocolate are SO good. Add in crunchy and chewy (like salty pretzels dipped in chewy caramel)... Okay it's lunch time!

1) I'm hard-pressed to think up someplace I don't want to go. I need to do Ireland and Spain next, though, if I'm gonna prioritize. These are at least feasible. For pure wild "If I could go anywhere" -- India. I suspect it would be utterly different from anywhere I've been before (and I've got a friend there who might be able to show me around, so I don't have to do the touristy thing).

1) London, because there's so much to see and do. I'd love to spend a year there, or perhaps a lifetime. Ireland, because it keeps calling me back. The people are warm, the countryside is gorgeous and full of the ruins of history, and the guys are both funny and hot (up until about the age of 45, when they all turn into little wizened garden gnomes).

Moonrat, when you go to Israel, you can ask customs to stamp an insert instead of your actual passport. You just slip the insert in your passport while you're in Israel, and then hide it or throw it away when you go to Syria, Egypt, or Jordan.

2) Creamy, cheesy, garlicky noodles, with a roux.

3) Salty! Fried! Though a case could be made for salty/sweet (yogurt or chocolate covered pretzels?) Or just plain sweet (ice cream!). But O! Salty! Fried!

Oh botheration! You want MY cat hairs spread across YOUR page?(1)Mey in Caithness, Scotland because my great-grandparents were born there and I need to know what it is like now so I can start to understand what it was like then(2) smidgeon of butter, parmesan and parsley(3) salty fried I fear

1) I would, like you, visit China, but for different reasons! Well, partly because I've never been and am into the history. But mainly because my great great great grandfather was one of the first missionaries to China and he spent his life there and was buried there. And he had a family there. So I'd like to go and find out about his life and visit his grave and meet my distant cousins.

2) Fusili, with a very rich tomato sauce and black olives and capers, mixed up with huge amounts of very melted Edam cheese. Oh god, I'm salivating just thinking about it...

1) Where would you visit and why? I'd hike the West Highland Way in Scotland. I want to visit see all the small towns along the trail. I'd sail the Nile- have wanted to every since I read about Champollion's trip. I'd see the Northern Lights in Alaska. (I shouldn't have to explain that.)

2) How do you take your pasta? I take lots of it. : )

3).Sweet or salty?Crispy, crunchy and salty. I can only eat straight-up sweet so much.

1) Where would you visit and why?Scenery--Mountains. Austrian Alps, US/Canada Rockies, Andes (Machu Picchu), Himalayas, Alaska, New Zealand, whatever that gorgeous mountain range is that I see in pictures of China.

Music--Ireland, Scotland, Wales, Russia.

Language--Saudi Arabia. I know, I know, but I'm learning Arabic and that's the accent I want. Paris, too.

2) How do you take your pasta?With a warm, garlicky breadstick, unlimited milk refills, plenty of napkins, and a fork.

3) Sweet or salty?Surprise me.

Here's the scoop on Israel/Syria, as told by someone who's been to both sides:

If you're heading into Israel, you'd better be able to explain having been in a country that wants it wiped off the map. Archaeological digs work. Study abroad might. Have a good answer.

If you're heading into a Muslim-majority nation, you'd better not have Israel on your passport. You can bypass this two ways: get a new passport, or, when entering Israel, ask them to stamp on a separate piece of paper.

Moonrat... about the passport deal.. if you visit Lebanon or Syria you cannot enter Israel for up to 6 months - they will not take you in and vice versa!I was in Lebanon last summer and Syria and I can tell you Baalbek (Heliopolis) is unbelievable! I've been to most of the worlds ancient Greek and Roman sites but Baalbek takes the cake along with Tyre (Sur) - no wonder Alexander the Great wanted to conquer those two ancient sites!!!

1) Where would you visit and why?India: bollywood dance, bollywood music, curry and bright clothing all in one country, it sounds like a dream2) How do you take your pasta?No one particular way. I like variety. But if I had to had to choose, maybe with bechamel sauce and lots of gooey stuff mixed in. Or pasta salad.3) Sweet or salty?Sweet AND salty. Haven't you ever had brownies with tortilla chips? Or fries dipped in a chocolate milk shake? There's no competition.

Now, for the real point of my comment: I LOVE SYRIA!!!!!! Lived there for several years and my novel takes place in Syria and I'll move back as soon as I figure out how I can get back there. As an American it's a bit tricky, but impossible - and if you visit Syria first Israel MIGHT let you in. If you visit Israel first, they MIGHT not stamp your passport so you have a shot.

Not to be plugging my blog or anything, but if you're ever bored and want to dream of Syria: http://blog.patrianoceu.org/search/label/Siria

1) Norway. Ever since I read Sigrid Undsett's Kristin Lavransdattir trilogy in high school, I've wanted to see Norway. I even started to teach myself Norwegian!

2) Homemade macaroni and cheese. Great for the tastebuds, not so great for the heart (or the waist!).

3) SWEET, without a doubt--especially since I gave up ALL sweets for Lent and haven't had a cookie or bite of pie for almost six weeks now! Looking forward to Easter Sunday and those chocolate eggs....